U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon on Monday permanently blocked the release of Volume II of former special counsel Jack Smith's report, which dealt with President Donald Trump's handling of classified materials after leaving office in January 2021. The volume was slated to be released on Tuesday.

Cannon granted Trump's request in a 15-page order that barred the Department of Justice from "releasing, distributing, conveying, or sharing with anyone outside the Department of Justice any information or conclusions in Volume II or in drafts thereof."

The ruling is a clean win for due process and a stinging rebuke to the legal apparatus that pursued Trump across two federal cases, secured no conviction, and then sought to publish its conclusions anyway.

The Core of Cannon's Reasoning

Cannon's order struck at the fundamental unfairness of allowing a prosecutor to air his case in public after the charges collapsed. She wrote that Smith, "acting without lawful authority, obtained an indictment in this action and initiated proceedings that resulted in a final order of dismissal of all charges." Releasing the report under those circumstances, she found, would constitute "manifest injustice" and "contravene basic notions of fairness and justice."

The judge also drew a sharp distinction between this situation and previous special counsel reports. Prior special counsels released final reports either after declining to bring charges or after securing guilty pleas or convictions at trial, Fox News reported. Cannon noted she could find no precedent for what Smith attempted:

"The Court strains to find a situation in which a former special counsel has released a report after initiating criminal charges that did not result in a finding of guilt, at least not in a situation like this one, where the defendants contested the charges from the outset and still proclaim their innocence."

That distinction matters. A report after a conviction documents the public record. A report after a dismissal is a prosecutor getting the last word without a verdict. Those are not the same thing.

The Bigger Picture

Smith was tapped by former Attorney General Merrick Garland in 2022 to investigate two matters: the alleged effort by Trump and his allies to overturn the results of the 2020 election, and Trump's retention of allegedly classified documents at Mar-a-Lago after leaving office. Smith had brought charges against Trump in both cases.

Cannon previously ruled that Smith was unconstitutionally appointed as special counsel. The classified documents matter was ultimately dismissed following Trump's re-election in 2024, with the charges dropped in keeping with a long-standing Justice Department policy that discourages prosecuting sitting presidents on federal criminal charges. Smith resigned from his role shortly afterward.

None of this resulted in a guilty plea. None of it resulted in a conviction. The legal process ran its course, and the government lost. That should have been the end of it.

Instead, Smith sought to release a report describing what he called "powerful evidence," effectively asking the public to render the guilty verdict that no courtroom ever did. He used public and private remarks to House Republicans in December and January to push back on the notion that his team acted politically, telling members of the House Judiciary Committee in a Dec. 17 interview:

"I made my decisions in the investigation without regard to President Trump's political association, activities, beliefs or candidacy in the 2024 presidential election."

Perhaps. But the insistence on publishing a report after every charge has been dismissed tells its own story. If the evidence was so powerful, it should have survived contact with a courtroom. It didn't.

Due Process Isn't Optional

The left spent years invoking "norms" and "institutions" as sacred principles. Here is a norm worth defending: the government does not get to publicly accuse people of crimes it failed to prove. That principle protects everyone, not just presidents.

Trump's former defense attorney Kendra Wharton praised the ruling in a statement to Fox News Digital, saying Cannon's "courage and judicial resolve on these important due process issues should be recognized and taught in law school classrooms across America."

She's right about the principle, if generous about the odds of it making the syllabus. Law schools have spent the last decade teaching students that process is an obstacle when the target is sufficiently unpopular. Cannon's order is a reminder that process exists precisely for those moments.

Where This Leaves Us

Volume I of Smith's report, covering the 2020 election matter, has already been released. Volume II now stays locked inside the Department of Justice, where it belongs. The classified documents case ended not with a conviction but with a dismissal. The report that sought to relitigate that case in the court of public opinion has been stopped.

The legal system worked exactly as it should. Charges were brought, contested, and ultimately dropped. A judge ensured that a prosecutor who secured no conviction could not bypass the verdict by publishing his brief to the nation.

That's not obstruction. That's the law.